Limitless Love

I just finished reading The Shack by William P. Young and I was forever changed. I don’t think I have ever read a book that opened my mind more to who God is outside of the Bible. It challenged me to rethink how I define God and my relationship with Him. I have no doubt that the Holy Spirit was at the center of the writing. As I came away from the book, I realized how much I limit God. I think we all do. We tend to categorize Him based on what we think He can do for us in a certain situation. If it’s just me, please ignore what I’m saying. But I think we have put God in a box. This isn’t a new concept but one that bears examination.

 I’m not going to tell the plot of the book but as I read, I looked at my life and saw the key to experiencing all that God wants to show us. We can’t look at God as an experience that’s based on the right song or preacher. It’s all about relationship. Think back to your early childhood and the person that you were the closest to that raised you, maybe it was your mama or daddy, and maybe it was your grandmother. We trusted them to take care of us and could often see that they would sacrifice everything to get us what we needed. We loved them with a pure love that wasn’t tainted by the world’s influence and expectations as we often are as adults. I believe that kind of love and relationship is what God is calling us back to. Just think about it, didn’t you think that person could do anything? Imagine if you gave God that type of love…I mean, after all He made the ultimate sacrifice.

I really needed a scripture that could capture what how our relationship with God can be if we will take the limits off. I found it in Ephesians 3. Paul is writing to the Ephesian church from jail and he is telling them about God’s plan for His people and Jesus’s role. His words say it all.

“My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God. God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.

Glory to God in the church!
Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!” (Ephesians 3: 14-21 MSG)

If you are at a point in your life where you seem to be standing still, stuck in a hard place or situation, I encourage you to look at your relationship with God. Are you still in love with Him? Have you let the cares of the world and your circumstances, dull your zeal for Him? God is a big God and nothing is impossible with Him but above all that He is love. Everything that He does comes back to His love for us. Allow His love to wash over you and cleanse you. Go before Him and ask that He refresh you and give you a fresh fire! Take Him out of the box of our human limitations. He is willing and able go beyond your wildest dreams.